FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1954
1954 - 2308.PDF
.IGHT, 20 August 1954 245 WOMEN in AVIATION It Started in 1783 Mrs. Miurice Hewlett flying a Farman biplane. She taught her son to fly at Brooklands, after which he joined the Royal Naval Air Service. IT is still considered, even in 1954, a matter of some moment for a woman to be closely concerned with avia tion. I know only too well the astonishment which is aroused when I present myself at a Royal Air Force station and indicate that, as a journalist, I am prepared to fly in a military aircraft, to say nothing of the difficulty of the initial negotiations necessary towards such an operation. A woman can, without causing comment, have herself conveyed from place to place in an airliner but as soon as she achieves some professional status in aviation she is likely to find herself as highlighted and.exposed as an actress visiting a meat market; and she must have a sturdy spirit to overcome the prejudice which still assumes that the air is man's domain. If she in sists, she must be prepared either to don a pair of blue stockings or to become an air hostess to get away with it. The odd thing is that it was not always so, nor is it true that women have only recently gone into the air. Aviation history records that on November 21st, 1783, the first aerial voyage was made by those two exquisites Pilatre de Rozier and the Marquis d'Arlandes, who ascended in a'Montgolfier balloon from the ever- romantic Bois de Boulogne; and only six months later, repeat six months, a lady of Lyons named Madame Thible made the first flight by a woman in a "free" balloon. In the years that followed, ballooning became a popular spectacle in which women played a considerable and (to judge from old prints and drawings) decorative role. It was at this time, too, that women's skill was first employed in aviation industry, for in 1795 they engaged in the manufacture of the earliest military balloons, presumably so that their betters could fully occupy themselves in their favourite pursuit. The 1800s gave us the first professional women-, aeronauts— Madame Blanchard, the balloonist, and Elisa Garnerin, the first parachutist. Mme. Blanchard's career took her over most of Europe in a glittering succession of ascents amidst showers of golden rain and ended with the appropriate flourish of a big (Right) Mme. Farman standing behind her husband, M. Maurice Farman, in one of his early pusher biplanes. (Below, left to right) Baroness Schenk, who was one of the women pilots flying at Hendon in 1912. Mrs. Stocks, who took part in "ladies' day" at Hendon on July 8th, 1912. Miss Dorothy Prentice, who was not only a flying pupil at the W.H. Ewen School at Hendon in 1912, but was also an aircraft mechanic. blaze kindled by one of her own fireworks. Elisa Garnerin, the "Venus Aerostatique," made many parachute jumps—early prelude to those of all the women who courageously dropped to the moonlit fields of France in the last war. While on the subject of ballooning it is fitting to mention the birth of the Aero Club of the United Kingdom. It is recorded that its conception took place in the basket of a balloon somewhere between the Crystal Palace and Sidcup; it was the brain child of Miss Vera Hedges Butler, a passenger on the flight. When the aeronauts came down to earth the gendemen of the party took themselves off to Somerset House to register the name of the infant. It is curious thereafter to discover that the name of Miss Butler does not appear among those of the organizing committee, although she was magnanimously permitted to become a member along with several other ladies. I think it is true to say that even today women are tolerated (though not encouraged) to take part in the Club's activities. Now, wiping that wry smile off our faces, we will turn to the birth of the powered aeroplane. The first powered, controlled, heavier-dian-air machine flew on December 17th, 1903, but it was not until 1908 that even a male passenger managed to be taken for a ride; then, three months later, Mme. Therese Peltier went /2/0 \ o/-y f
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
